Podcasts about mothercoders

Kriz Bell is local to the San Francisco Bay Area where she spent her childhood before attending Mills College. She brings more than 15 years of professional experience in multimedia, strategic communications, and culture work. She has designed, directed, and produced various initiatives within the corporate and nonprofit sectors focusing on inclusion, diversity, and social change through the strategic use of media and communications for connecting and engaging different audiences. Her skill with strategic communications was instrumental in the expansion and engagement of organizations including the Anita Borg Institute, TechInclusion, MotherCoders, S.H.E. Globl Media, and the Better Man Conference as well as Cisco, Google, and SunPower among others. Her tenure with organizations such as Change Catalyst, Google, Jennifer Brown Consulting, and the Better Man Movement, has increased her understanding of the influence that language, media, and inequity play in our culture, personally and professionally. Knowing the power that community and the corporate arena play in our world, has been the impetus for helping organizations of all sizes to become people-first places that prioritize inclusion and promote belonging. In her latest iteration as a partner with the Better Man Movement, Kriz DEI experience, production, and communication skills to the team. She is excited to share her knowledge to help organizations create and curate the resources relevant to their specific experiences in order to meet innovation goals with inclusive and intersectional teams.

In this episode, we sit down with Trina Limpert who is the President of Women @ eBay Technology Programs. We learn about her program, how it started, works, and ultimate goals. We talk about how programs like this benefit everyone and how folks can be supportive. We learn how she manages her time and team across various time zones and what she most likes about her job. We wrap up with some news on her recent work with MotherCoders.org and how companies can get involved with that program.

In this episode, we sit down with Trina Limpert who is the President of Women @ eBay Technology Programs. We learn about her program, how it started, works, and ultimate goals. We talk about how programs like this benefit everyone and how folks can be supportive. We learn how she manages her time and team across various time zones and what she most likes about her job. We wrap up with some news on her recent work with MotherCoders.org and how companies can get involved with that program.

Welcome back to Tech Forward, listeners, and happy Halloween! This week, I'm reissuing a classic episode: my interview with Tina Lee, Founder and CEO of MotherCoders. Based in San Francisco, MotherCoders is a non-profit that’s expanding the tech talent pool by helping women with kids gain the skills, knowledge, and connections they need to thrive in today's digital economy. Tina’s career journey has taken her from management consulting and recruiting roles in the private sector, to philanthropy and nonprofit roles in the public sector. She’s passionate and prolific about the digital economy, especially the changing needs of women and families in a digital, globalized world. We discussed how MotherCoders came to be, and how Tina is helping moms of all types launch their tech careers. Currently, 86% of women will become moms, and with millennials becoming parents, there are more moms than ever with college degrees. As a person with caregiving responsibilities of her own, however, Tina discovered first hand that the free or low-cost and easily accessible options like meetups and workshops were not easy for her to attend. Recognizing a huge opportunity to provide moms with both caregivers and a space to learn, she launched the MotherCoders pilot in 2014. Since then, they have trained over 150 women, both through standalone events as well as a part-time 9 week program. MotherCoders — which serves working moms seeking career advancement, reentering the workforce, and starting down the path of entrepreneurship — isn’t a boot camp or job training program. Instead, it’s a space where moms can integrate their past experiences, skills, and resources with technical skills and contextual knowledge to get them into a role where they will have wage security and advancement opportunities. Providing this support for mothers now also supports their children down the line. Not only do children of working mothers go on to earn more as adults, but studies show children’s academic trajectory compares to that of their mothers. “It’s a great way to inspire the next generation! Why would you not do this for mothers?” The structure of MotherCoders addresses the top 3 barriers for mothers: time, money, and caregiving responsibilities. Along with competitive pricing, they offer a mother-friendly schedule and on-site childcare. With this approach, they provide a welcoming environment for people who have been systematically shut out. MotherCoders is open to all women: “If you’re a woman, and you’re the primary caregiver for a child under 17, you are welcome here.” Moving forwards, Tina’s ultimate goal is to expand MotherCoders to new locations. She wants to design a flexible program with core components that people can adjust according to the unique needs of their local ecosystem. If you’re interested in helping make this licensing model a reality and having MotherCoders come to your city someday, you can donate today. Tina, as a mom myself, I love the work you’re doing. Thank you so much for coming on the show, and thank you to all of you out there listening. I'll see you next week with a brand new episode! Connect with us Website | Twitter | Instagram | Facebook

Welcome back to Tech Forward! This week, I spoke with Tina Lee, Founder and CEO of MotherCoders. Based in San Francisco, MotherCoders is a non-profit that’s expanding the tech talent pool by helping women with kids gain the skills, knowledge, and connections they need to thrive in today's digital economy. Tina’s career journey has taken her from management consulting and recruiting roles in the private sector, to philanthropy and nonprofit roles in the public sector. She’s passionate and prolific about the digital economy, especially the changing needs of women and families in a digital, globalized world. We discussed how MotherCoders came to be, and how Tina is helping moms of all types launch their tech careers. Currently, 86% of women will become moms, and with millennials becoming parents, there are more moms than ever with college degrees. As a person with caregiving responsibilities of her own, however, Tina discovered first hand that the free or low-cost and easily accessible options like meetups and workshops were not easy for her to attend. Recognizing a huge opportunity to provide moms with both caregivers and a space to learn, she launched the MotherCoders pilot in 2014. Since then, they have trained over 150 women, both through standalone events as well as a part-time 9 week program. MotherCoders — which serves working moms seeking career advancement, reentering the workforce, and starting down the path of entrepreneurship — isn’t a boot camp or job training program. Instead, it’s a space where moms can integrate their past experiences, skills, and resources with technical skills and contextual knowledge to get them into a role where they will have wage security and advancement opportunities. Providing this support for mothers now also supports their children down the line. Not only do children of working mothers go on to earn more as adults, but studies show children’s academic trajectory compares to that of their mothers. “It’s a great way to inspire the next generation! Why would you not do this for mothers?” MotherCoders addresses the top 3 barriers for mothers: time, money, and caregiving. Along with competitive pricing, they offer a mother-friendly schedule and on-site childcare. This way, they provide a welcoming environment for people who have been systematically shut out.  Moving forwards, Tina’s ultimate goal is to expand MotherCoders to new locations. She wants to design a flexible program with core components that people can adjust according to the unique needs of their local ecosystem. If you’re interested in helping make this licensing model a reality and having MotherCoders come to your city someday, you can donate today. Tina, as a mom myself, I love the work you’re doing. Thank you so much for coming on the show, and thank you to all of you out there listening. See you next week!

There’s been a lot of debate and controversy around the lack of women and minorities being represented in tech companies from entry-level to the C-suite and board room. However, what isn’t showcased is how there is sisterhood within tech, where women are helping each other out, and enacting change at every level from schools to the board room. To talk about how women are investing and encouraging each other, I’ve invited Samantha Walravens who is the co-author of the new book Geek Girl Rising: Inside the Sisterhood Shaking Up Tech. If you’re a woman, minority, or male ally you’ll learn from Samantha how: Women like Maria Klawe at Harvey Mudd have tripled the number of women graduating with Computer Science degrees Women are connecting female founders to female angel investors and influencers to grow their startups Corporations are changing and disrupting the dynamics of the boardroom   This is the last episode of FemgineerTV but don’t worry it’s not the end... After hosting FemgineerTV and listening to audience members like you for the past 2 ½ years, myself and my sponsor Pivotal Tracker decided it was time for a fun format! Starting next month, I’m going to be launching a new show called Build. I think you’ll enjoy the new format for Build. Each week you’ll receive a short video on a topic to help you build a product, company, and career in tech. So stay tuned for the launch of Build :) Want to help us get the word out about Build? Please take a moment to leave a review on iTunes here. If you’ve never left a review, here is a quick tutorial on how to do. -- Poornima: Welcome to another episode of *Femgineer TV*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker, I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker, the founder of Femgineer.                                 In this show, I invite innovators in tech, and together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building tech products and companies.                                 One of the most heated topics today is the lack of women and minorities represented in tech; from entry level, to the C suite, to the board room. While we all know this is already a problem, in today's episode, we're going to be talking about some of the solutions, and showing how there are companies and organizations enacting these solutions.                                 And to help us out, I've invited Samantha Walravens, who is the coauthor of the latest book, *Geek Girl Rising: Inside The Sisterhood Shaking Up Tech*. Thanks so much for joining us today, Samantha.   Samantha: Thanks for having me!   Poornima: Yeah, it's wonderful.                                 Let's start by talking about why you and your coauthor, Heather Cabot, decided to write this book.   Sharing The Unspoken Narrative of Women In Technology   Samantha: The inspiration for this book was a conversation I had about three years ago with a friend of mine, who's been in Silicon Valley for 20 years. She's a woman, she's the VP of sales in business development, and she's worked in a number of tech startups, and we were having coffee, and she said, "Sam, I cannot tell you what just happened in my performance group review, it was last week, and my manager commented on what I was wearing, the color of my dresses, the jewelry I wore, and he told me that I was too aggressive, and too bossy, and I needed to tone it down a bit." Meanwhile, she is the head of sales, and she was rocking her number out of the park. So she said, "Sam, you've got to write something." She knew I was a journalist. She said, "You've got to write something and you have to talk about this kind of discrimination and this kind of sexism in Silicon Valley."                                 Mind you this is before the *Newsweek* article came out, "What does Silicon Valley really think of women," people were discussing women in technology, but it really was not a top of mind—and so I started to do a little digging, and researching and interviewing women. And what I found was, yes, there's sexism, there is harassment, there's discrimination, there's unconscious bias, it's there, it's a problem we need to talk about it and deal with it.                                 But there was another narrative, another discussion that wasn't being told, which was: these women want to talk about the companies they were building, the technologies they were creating, the women who are supporting them and helping them along the way in their careers. There was this whole other narrative that was missing from the conversation that was happening in the national news media about sexism in Silicon Valley.                                 And I thought, "we have to discuss this." So, Heather Cabot, who's my coauthor, was in New York, I'm in San Francisco, we talked, and she said, "Sam, I've been researching this topic," it was kind of a coincidence, it was like one of those weird moments of weird fate. And she said, "I've been researching this topic, let's work together." So we put our heads together and we just started digging into the topic, and it's been three years now, and finally the book is coming out!   The Sisterhood That Is Supporting Women In Tech in Silicon Valley And Beyond   Poornima: So one thing I experienced early on in my career, and it keeps me motivated, is the women who inspired me. So, early on, when I was a college student in engineering school, I had a professor, and she had twins, and she was doing her research, and she was teaching, and she was leading the department, and I thought, "If she could do it, I could do it." And as I was reading the book, I noticed the theme of the sisterhood kind of coming up again and again.                                 Tell us how you discovered this theme as you started writing or as you were doing your research.   Samantha: Of course. Well, I too had a mentor back in my Silicon Valley days when I worked for a software startup during the dotcom boom in 1998 to about 2003, so I saw the dotcom boom and the bust happen, I was living through it, our company went public, stock went to 130, then went down to two, so I lived and breathed the dotcom boom and bust.                                 My manager/boss at that point was Carol Carpenter, who has since gone on to become—she was the CEO, actually CMO of ClearSlide and then CEO of ElasticBox, so she's a prominent woman in Silicon Valley, and she really pulled me up. She really, when I was lacking confidence, and I thought, "I can't do this," I'd just had my baby, my first baby, we were going public, and I thought, "I can't do this, this is crazy." We're working 24/7 and I have a newborn at home. She was the one who said, "Sam, you can do it, you can do it." And having that kind of mentorship and that kind of woman who was going through it herself pulling me up, really encouraged me.                                 So as we were researching the book, we started noticing these pockets around the startup universe, women who were supporting each other, investing in each other, encouraging each other in their careers and inspiring the next generation of girls and young women to pursue technology and continue their careers in technology.   Encouraging The Next Generation of Women To Consider Careers In Tech   Poornima: Yeah, that's great. I think you're absolutely right, that is a narrative that's missing from the media and more women need to know that that's out there as well, so that they don't feel like all there is is just what the media portrays.                                 Now, the first place that you write about change happening is at the primary school up to the high school level, so walk us through what that looks like.   Samantha: Well, fortunately, before Obama left office, he did create an initiative, a $4 billion initiative called "Computer Science for All" that is encouraging and putting funds towards creating computer science curriculum in schools throughout the country. I was so excited to read about Rahm Emanuel in Chicago, in the Chicago public schools now, computer science is a requirement for all high schools in Chicago. So I think we're going to see more of that.                                 When you look at the numbers, though, we still have a long way to go, cause 25% of high schools in the U.S. offer computer science, I think it's like 22% of girls, of students taking the computer science AP exam are girls, so we still have a long way to go.                                 What we noticed, though, it's sort of this grassroots movement of women who are encouraging the younger generations to start building, to start creating, to start coding. For example, we start our book talking about Debbie Sterling, who's the founder and the CEO of Goldie Blocks, and she's got this great—I have two little girls, we have it at home, it's a great toy that encourages girls to build, and there's a really fun, positive role model, Goldie, who builds a spinning machine and she has all these sorts of engineering—you wouldn't even know it's engineering, it's really just building Ferris wheels and building merry-go-rounds and all these fun things, along with the story, talking about Goldie and her friends, and how she's building these different fun games and amusement park rides. We have that in our household.                                 These are the kinds of things that women are doing to try to inspire the next generation. There is a woman in our book who started a company called Bitcode, she's actually working with the public schools to get them to use video to teach girls how to code. So if you have kids you know that they're on video, they're on YouTube, and they're really tech savvy. I have four kids, they can get around YouTube, and iMovie, and they're all over it. So, this tool is used in the public schools, to teach coding, using videos, to make it fun.   How Colleges Are Changing The Ratio Of Women Graduating With Computer Science Degrees Poornima: It's great, yeah, it's good to see these grassroots efforts, so that even if there is kind of a gap in terms of change for public schools or the school system in general, there's ways in which parents and teachers can supplement that.                                 So, the next place in which a lot of women and minorities drop off is at the college level, tell us who's working on changing that.   Samantha: Well, we had the most amazing experience at Grace Hopper in 2015. I believe you were there, and Heather and I, my coauthor and I went, and just to see, I think it was 12,000 women there in computing, and it is a true celebration. And to see the enthusiasm and the excitement and the bonding between these young women, it was so encouraging.                                 When you look at specific colleges, there's a lot being done to encourage more women in to pursue technology and computer science. I met with Maria Klawe, who's the president of Harvey Mudd, and wow! What a firecracker she is, she skateboards around campus, she's just a really fun, wonderful woman, and she implemented a program along with her colleagues a few years ago, where there are two tracks for computer science, so as a freshman you can take the gold track or the black track.                                 The gold track is for students who have not had any computer science experience in high school; the black track is for students who've had some experience. So, by doing this, the students who have not had experience don't feel so impostered, they don't have the confidence cause no one's had this experience, so they get through this year and I spoke to a couple of students who have taken these classes, and they say that by the end of the year, everyone's pretty much at the same level.                                 So, she, Maria Klawe, and her team has tripled the number of women graduating with computer science degrees at Harvey Mudd in the past ten years, and the number is, I hate to throw in all these numbers, cause they get little mind boggling at times, but 55% of the computer science graduates at Harvey Mudd are now women.   Poornima: That's great, it's a nice change to—the numbers go up.   Samantha: There's also Stanford. Another example of what's going on to encourage women to pursue computer science is Stanford University, of course a top institution, but they have a Women in Tech group called She++, which was started by Ayna Agarwal, and who was not even a computer science major by the way, but she started this group to encourage women and they had a Gala, every year, which gathers all the women in technology, not just Stanford. What they do is they go out into the communities and they take on high school students in different communities around the country and they support these young high school girls to start programs in their communities. For example, I live out in Marin County, and there is a girl who started a robotics happy schooler box program in Marin City, which is an underserved community in Marin County, and she runs this afterschool program in Marin City.                                 So all of these girls around the country who are starting these programs through She++ gather together for this gala, and I am telling you, if you could be there to see these college women, these high school girls who came, they were dressed to the nines, they were glamorous, I mean, talk about debunking the myths and breaking stereotypes about what a woman in tech looks like, I mean, we could have been in an LA nightclub, not to sound like—but they were so beautiful and wonderful and smart and excited to talk about their programs, and they were so excited to be in technology. And again, this is why Heather and I said, "This is a story that no one sees," you don't see this kind of enthusiasm around technology, you see, "Oh, it's so hard, numbers are dropping, it's all doom and gloom." And so we really wanted to tell that other story.   The Angel Investors And Others Who Are Supporting Female Founders   Poornima: OK. That brings us back to industry, and I know there's a lot going on at the corporate level, as well as startups. I'm of course partial to startups, so let's start there and talk about how the ecosystem is changing for women and minorities.   Samantha: There's a lot of momentum behind supporting female founders. For example, there are accelerator programs like the Women Startup Lab, which is down here at Menlo Park; there's MergeLane, which is in Colorado; there's The Refinery in Connecticut. These programs focus on female founders, and really giving them the tools, the skills they need to grow their company into a venture, fundable company. And they give the tools to learn how to pitch venture capitalists, and we all know the venture capital world is very male dominated.   Poornima: Yeah, it is a challenge. I know I've had my fair share of doing the fundraising.                                 So, there's a very common problem around women and minorities getting up and pitching their business to VCs, either male VCs not getting their idea, or they don't think it's a big enough market, or there's a lot of unconscious bias around it, so how are women getting their training to get over all of that?   Samantha: Well, you've started a company, so you know what it's like. The founders that we've met, that I've met in my journey with this book, are so passionate about their idea. But you can have an idea, and it's not going to go anywhere—you have to have the product market fit, you have to test the idea, you have to build your team out—and so these programs are really teaching women what they need to do to get to that level, to actually pitch to investors. But when you look at the numbers, I think it's 10% of the venture funding, globally, goes to female founders—it's still a really small percentage.                                 We've also noticed that there's women who are angels. So angel investors who fund companies at the early stages—for example, Joanne Wilson, aka Gotham Gal, who has a tremendous momentum in New York City, who has invested in a number of really great companies; Caren Maio, Nestio, Shanna Tellerman, Modsy—she finds these women, who have ideas that are big, that are scalable, and she nurtures them, and she's like the fairy godmother to these women. And there are other women that we talk about, we'd had to read the book to learn about all of them, but there are women who really take these female founders under their wing and support them on their journey.   Poornima: I think it's great that there are women like Joanne Wilson out there. Do you have a sense of how many companies she's invested in?   Samantha: Joanne Wilson has invested in around a hundred companies, and they're doing fantastic. One of them, Shanna Tellerman, started the company Modsy, which is an immersive, 3D environment for home décor, home design, and she told us that she created this project called “The Pinnacle Project,” at Park City, Utah, and it was Wednesday through Sunday, I think. And she invited Joanne, and Susan Lyne, and a bunch of angel investors, as well as a number of female founders, to come gather, network, ski, and have fun, and she said it was funny, because all the women were thinking, "We should be home, we should be working, we should be with the kids, we have so much to do," and she said she had to tell and remind people that, "This is what the guys do. They have a boys call and they pick off and it's all about business, whereas women don't have that sense of, “Let's go out to ski, or golf,” and that kind of networking, so it was an example of this pinnacle project, which is going to happen recurring every year, of, "OK, women, we can get together, have fun together, network, introduce each other to investors and influencers, and have fun while we're doing it. It's OK."   Poornima: Yeah. That's fantastic. And I think another thing you had mentioned pipeline ventures, or pipeline angels?   Samantha: Pipeline angels, yes, yes. Natalia Oberti Noguera is a force of nature and she started this angel investing group for women and I went through it and Heather went through it. I did it in San Francisco, Heather did it in New York, and basically it's a training, it's a bootcamp or a training program for women who are credited investors, to learn how to invest in female and minority-led companies. So it walked us through the process of how do you set evaluation on a company, what do you look for in a startup that you're investing in, what kind of traits you want to look for in the team, what's going to make this a good investment. So it trains women to invest as angels, and then you actually make an investment at the end.                                 We made an investment in a great startup—which I believe is still hush hush, underground at this point—but I believe we made a great investment and we're following the course of these early stage female founders, and it's really her goal to change the face of angel investing, to increase the amount of money going towards these early stage female founders.   Poornima: As we were doing research for your book and when I was reading it, I noticed that there was some astonishing findings, like only 11 companies that were founded by African-American women have received funding over a million dollars. So walk us through who is working to change this.   Samantha: Well, that number has actually increased, it's now 13 companies that have received more than a million dollars, but the numbers are still really low. One woman who is really on top of this problem is Kathryn Finney, who is the founder of DigitalUndivided, which is an organization whose main purpose is to increase the number of women, minorities in the tech world, latino women, and black women founders, and she just recently launched an accelerator, in Atlanta, Georgia, called the Big Innovation Center, and I think their first cohort is gathering this year to help skill up and prepare these minority founders to raise money.   How Tech Companies Are Growing Up And Changing How The Nature of Work   Poornima: So let's switch gears, and talk about corporations. We previously had Lisen Stromberg on the show, talking about the changes that were happening for parents—what have you seen?   Samantha: Well, what we've noticed is that Silicon Valley is growing up. They are trading in their ping-pong tables and foosball tables for nursing rooms, which is inspiring to see. When I started out, I had my Medela Pump in Style in a cold bathroom out of the courtyard of our startup, so it wasn't pretty, but we spent a day at Eventbrite not too long ago, and Julia Hartz, who's now the CEO of Eventbrite, it's very focused on woman, developing women in leadership positions and allowing for work-life balance. And I say that word, “work-life balance,” a term that is loaded, what she's trying to do with that company is focus on the whole person, not just the employee self.                                 For example, they have a program called “Take the time you need.” So if you need time to care for a child or to care for an adult, you can work from home, you can take time off, so she's really interested in her employees, and telling her employees, "You can do what you need to do, so you can live a life and you can be an employee."                                 And she also tells the women who are having babies at her company, she says, "You know what? You can get through the first six to nine months," it gets a lot easier, because a lot of women when they have their babies early on, they think, “I can't leave this poor creature alone with a daycare with a babysitter,” and she says, “If you can just get through that”—she's got two little girls herself—”If you can just get through that time, stick with it, come back, and we will support you while you're doing it,” which is fantastic.   Poornima: You also showcase companies like Power to Fly. Walk us through what Power to Fly is.   Samantha: Yeah, Power to Fly was started by Milena Berry and Katharine Zaleski. Katharine actually wrote an article apologizing to all the mothers out there. Before she had children, she was a little bit judgemental of mothers taking time off and having to leave work early, and then she had her first baby and she thought, "Oh, my gosh, this is really hard," so she and Milena got together and started this company, Power to Fly, which connects women with remote and flexible job positions, so they can actually care for their family and pursue careers in technology. The great thing about technology is that it can be done remotely. Especially if you're in coding, you don't have to be in an office 24/7, so Power to Fly works on that.                                 Another great program is Tina Lee started a program called MotherCoders, and she's based in San Francisco, a fabulous woman, her program retrains mothers in tech skills, so they can go off and they can—either they've taken time off or they have background in some other field, they can skill up in technology, and go out and get the tremendous amount of jobs that are available in technology as they get back to work.   Disrupting The Boardroom   Poornima: Well, that brings us to the boardroom, so walk us through what changes are happening there.   Samantha: The number of women holding board seats in our country is still very, very low, I think the number is 18% of board seats at Fortune 500 companies are held by women. So we still have a long way to go.                                 One real pioneer in this area is a woman, her name is Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, she's fabulous, she is the CEO and founder of a company called Joyus, a tech company, and she, a few years ago penned an article called "Tech Women Choose Possibility." And she really wanted to profile the women in Silicon Valley, in the startup world, who are doing great things, just founding great companies. There was a lot of positive response to that article, and so she created an organization called #choosepossibility.                                 Part of that organization is a group called, or an initiative called "The Boardlist." And basically it's a matchmaking tool that matches qualified, board-ready women with startup, tech companies, looking to fill board seats with women, so she made that happen, and they placed three women on the board, which it seems like it's very low, but what they're doing is they're connecting the VCs and the startup companies with these women, and a lot more placements have been made not directly through the platform, but just through the connections that have been made on this platform.   Poornima: OK, great, so it's good to know that there is some change happening at the board level as well.                                 Well, thank you so much for joining us today, Samantha, I know our viewers out there are going to enjoy reading your book, *Geek Girl Rising*. And for our viewers who are women, minority, and allies, is there anything else you would like to share with them in terms of resources?   Samantha: Yeah. I would love to see everybody come to our website. We have a gazillion resources on how you can join the digital revolution, just take a peek.   Poornima: Thanks for tuning in today and special thanks to our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker, for their help in producing this episode of *Femgineer TV*. If you've enjoyed this episode, then please be sure to share it with your friends, your teammates, your boss, and everyone so that they get to benefit from all the great resources, and subscribe to our channel to receive the next episode.                                Ciao for now! -- FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer and Pivotal Tracker. San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA.

There are a lot of people who want to change their career later in life. They want to do more challenging work, earn more money, and have a better lifestyle. Given the growing need of technical talent in the US, it would see like a technical career would be a great choice, right? Unfortunately despite the dearth of technical talent, many people are wary because of the misconception that transitioning into a technical career later in life is just too hard. Another is, as you start to fall behind on your technical skills, it’s hard to play catch up! Hence, a lot of people struggle to stay relevant. Piling on career pauses like parenthood make it even harder! However, the growing number of retraining programs, bootcamps, and online education options are looking to cater to busy people who are eager to transition into a technical position. In today’s episode we’ll talk to Tina Lee, who is actively is working to change these misconceptions with her nonprofit MotherCoders, which helps moms on-ramp to technical careers in the new economy. You’ll learn from Tina: Why people get put on the mommy track and how it does a disservice to women who want to continue to pursue their careers Why technical skills are crucial for employment and why Tina is focused on helping mothers acquire them Why companies shouldn’t withhold investing in a retraining program and how it can benefit employees and employers attract and retain top technical talent Show Notes Check out MotherCoders at http://www.mothercoders.org/  FemgineerTV is produced as a partnership between Femgineer ((http://femgineer.com/) and Pivotal Tracker (http://www.pivotaltracker.com/). San Francisco video production by StartMotionMEDIA (http://www.startmotionmedia.com/design/).   Full Transcript Poornima:         Welcome to another episode of *Femgineer TV*, brought to you by Pivotal Tracker. I'm your host, Poornima Vijayashanker, the founder of Femgineer. In this show, I host innovators in tech and together we debunk myths and misconceptions related to building tech products and companies. One common misconception I come across a lot is how challenging it can be to pursue a technical career midway through your career.             Another is that it's really hard once you've lost track of your technical skills, or they've gotten rusty, to get back on track. One woman, Tina Lee, is working to change this misconception. She is the founder of MotherCoders, a nonprofit, that helps moms on ramp to technical careers in the new economy. Thanks for joining us, Tina. Tina Lee:            Thanks for having me. Poornima:         Yeah. So, I know you and I met about a year ago at a conference, but I'm not too familiar with your background. Why don't you just tell us a little bit about how you got started. Tina Lee:            So, I started this journey towards having a technical career when I became a management consultant coming out of college. I helped implement large, enterprise-level IT systems and from there I kind of had this epiphany that tech was going to play a major role in business, and it was just a matter of time before the rest of the world was going to be transformed by it as well, and then after that I did technical recruiting. I spent some time in grad school studying education technology, and then ended up working on behalf of nonprofits and government and helping them use technology better to meet their goals. Poornima:         So that's great that you've had all this exposure to technology in your career. What ultimately inspired you to start MotherCoders? Tina Lee:            Well, like a lot of people who are inspired to make change, it came from a deep place of pain. Poornima:         Yeah, what was your pain? Tina Lee:            So, I had been trained to do simple things, build simple things: HTML, CSS, a little bit of JavaScript. I even tried learning Ruby for a while. And it was fine until I had my second child, right? The programs that are available to beginners usually happen on the evenings or on the weekend or online. And I felt like because I had just had a baby, my second one, I felt very isolated. So, doing it online felt very lonely and I couldn't make these in-person classes anymore, so out of that I had this vision of like, you know what? I cannot be the only mother, a new mother, who’s experiencing this. I should just organize kind of an informal meet up because my grandmother had met me.                             I had envisioned maybe some grandmas here on the corner and then we'd be doing our thing here. And ultimately what happened was I had so many women that filled out this informal Google Poll that I had about their interest level that I said, "OK. There's enough there to do something more organized." So I ran a pilot out of a co-working space that was empty on Saturdays and just happened to be next to an onsite child care facility center. Poornima:         Wow. Tina Lee:            Yeah. So that we were able to run the classes in the conference rooms and then have the kids be cared for by professional caregivers in a setting that was set up for them. Poornima:         That's awesome. So you really saw the opportunity. One as like a personal pain point that you experienced but then after you do this experiment there were a number of women who were interested. And then from that point, how did you transition into making it the nonprofit that it is today? Tina Lee:            So, I'm all about failing fast and rocket prototyping. So that was kind of my way of experimenting with this model. And because so many women had reached out, ones who could not participate in the pilot for one reason or another, I knew that there were moms out there that were hungry. And once you dig deeper into the numbers it collaborates that, right? I know you had Lisen Stromberg on the show recently and you look at the numbers about how many millennia women are about to become mothers, right? A million a year for the next 10 years or so. And then you look at how millennia women are going to be the largest and the most educated demographic ever, right? And then you look at who’s already a mom now.                                There's just tremendous opportunity to help moms who are either stuck on the sidelines and they want to get into tech but can't. Or they're in a job where they're not touching it and they want to move up. This is a great way to activate them and give them a skill set that will help them stay competitive. And we even have entrepreneurs who feel like they need a bigger tool set. They want like a wider understanding of how the ecosystem’s working so they can really launch their ventures. They come to us for that understanding and then also the community, too. That's a big part of what we do is the community because like I said being a mom is very isolating. Poornima:         Yeah that's fantastic. I'm sure some of our viewers out there who are entrepreneurs will be interested to learn a little bit more. So it’s great that there are going to be all these millennial women who are becoming mothers but I know there's still a problem when it comes to leadership, and as you and I have noticed, within tech itself only 26% of women hold computing jobs. So, how do you think MotherCoders is helping with that? Tina Lee:            Well, couple of things. One, we've kind of discussed this a lot which is a pipeline issue. Yes. We could be graduating more women with degrees in computer science or engineering but we also do a terrible job as a society of helping women thrive once they become mothers, right? No one ever says the term “working dad.” We just assume that— Poornima:         That's true. Tina Lee:            —you're going to be working. Poornima:         Yeah. Tina Lee:            But for mothers, I think as a society, culturally, we're still very ambivalent about how we feel about women working outside the home once they become mothers, but if you think about it, mothers are the people that you work with, right? They're the people sitting around you and they're your cohort next to you that's going to be taking over this role. It’s just the workplace is not set up to help women succeed, right? The IT worker is all in, all the time. Poornima:         Right. Tina Lee:            And if you have caregiving responsibilities, that's impossible, right? And women are kind of pressured to make a choice because there are not...there just aren't the social support systems, right? School lets out at 3. Poornima:         Yeah. Tina Lee:            There's no paid parental leave, right? And a lot of companies are just starting to experiment with flexible work hours, right? So all these things make it very difficult for women who feel like they want to prioritize their families and of course at the same time they're made to choose. Poornima:         Yep. I do remember in Lisen Stromberg's interview we talked about this caregiving bias. So it’s great that you touched upon it. I think you also mentioned in a talk earlier the mommy tax versus the fatherhood bonus. Walk us through why this disparity exists.   Tina Lee:            Oh man, we're going to get sad. OK. So, because of this ideal worker model, right? You're expected to go in all the time. Once you become a mother, everyone knows what that means and what that looks like, right? Based on our certain circumstances. Our current set of circumstances. So, automatically men and women will think, "OK. So this person is either going to be downshifting their careers or they're going to drop out altogether." Right? "And if they do stay they're probably not going to go all in. So let’s put them on the mommy track." So, women aren't left with that many choices right? So the way I frame the mommy tax is that automatically you're considered less valuable.                                 Right? And that will represent...that will manifest itself in salary negotiations, in having projects that will help you reach the next level, in helping you maybe make connections or professional development that will bring you to the next level. So there's a tax not only in real terms in salary but also a tax in terms of the opportunity cost.   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            Of what you could have done if you didn't become a mother in the eyes of the employer. Now it’s such a powerful bias that women who aren't even mothers get hit by it right? I mean how many stories have we heard of women walking in to pitch their companies or trying to get a job and they say, “Are you going to be pregnant?” Or, “You're married, do you plan to have kids anytime soon?” Not only is that illegal.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            That automatically kind of primes everyone in the room to think like, "Oh, right. You're a woman. There's a high chance that you'll become a mother and you're just going to peace out at some point and why should we invest in you." Right? So that's the motherhood penalty. On the flip side, the opposite is happening to men. "Oh! You're going to become a dad? This means you're going to be...you're going to be going in even harder because now you're responsible for caring for a family, right? You should be given the best projects because you really need to get to the next level. And you really should get a salary bump because now you're responsible for all these people."   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So it’s just a very unfair situation where women are getting hit by this mommy tax and dads are not. And women are already a lot of times behind because of the gender pay gap that they came into before all this even happened.   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            Oh and for every child that you have, additional child, you get hit a little bit more.   Poornima:         What can we do to sort of alleviate this? Or what...what can people do to sort of empower themselves?   Tina Lee:            Well, I think we need to talk about it in several levels, right? One is the individual level. One may be at the company level. And then one at a society level. So I'm going to start personal. Personally, I think one of the strategies that I've employed is you really have to take stock of your own capacity.   Poornima:         Mm-hmm.   Tina Lee:            What are my goals? What are my passions? What do I want to do? What capacity do I have in terms of caregiving? Do I have family to help me out? Do I have friends? Do I live in a community where there's support systems? So all of these things have to be taken into consideration. And I specifically stayed in a neighborhood in San Francisco that has a high density of in-home child care providers, and preschools, and great elementary schools to kind of situate myself where I would have these resources available to me. Other people move in, their parents.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Other people move closer to their parents. Everyone has a different situation, right? And I'm lucky in that I have a great partner. So all of these things help me succeed. But on a company level, what would make it even better, as I mentioned earlier, some flexible schedules. If I have a role where I pretty much can do work without being physically in the office, I should be allowed to do that, right?   Poornima:         Yep.   Tina Lee:            And if I happen to work with other people who are caregiving, not just kids but for their parents, or they happen to do other things in the community, they should be given that right, too. So having this flexibility actually benefits everyone in the company.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Paid parental leave is huge, right? And also really thinking about how to combat that implicit bias against women and mothers, right? And that kind of speaks to the larger problem of the societal expectation that women are expected to provide caregiving and men are not, that women should stay home after they have kids, right?   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            And the reality is that our society's changing, women are more educated, they're working. Forty-five percent of families with kids under 18 now have two working parents working full time to stay afloat, right? And so the reality is that we need to change some policies around how we support parents in general, caregivers in general. And I'm really glad that people like Sheryl Sandberg through *Lean In*, Emily Slaughter through her books, and then Lisa, too, are really tackling this societal piece because we can't change. We're not going to see change until we have culture change and I think that's a long-term thing that needs to happen.   Poornima:         So let’s bring it back to the struggle to stay relevant, right? You take a pause for parenthood, or you downshift, or maybe you don't even downshift, but there's this perception that you are downshifting. So I think it’s great that there are retraining programs like yours. How do you see these programs evolving overtime?   Tina Lee:            I don't know.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            That's the honest answer.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            I don't know, because—   Poornima:         But you see people embracing them?   Tina Lee:            Yes, people are embracing them, but I think we're at the beginning stages of just having this consciousness that tech is moving really fast.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            We live in this world where you have to continuously learn in order to stay relevant whether you're a caregiver or not, right?   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            That's why companies invest in professional development budgets and provide access to online training courses or learning plans. So I think we as a society know that people need to stay fresh on top of the skills and understand how fast things are changing in the industries, right? And that's why they invest in the professional development piece, but they also will have to come up with new ways of providing those to people who may not have the capacity to go to the one-week conference.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Or the “take three months off to learn how to become a full-stack web developer” type of programs, right? Those all-in programs are going to be very challenging for people with caregiving responsibilities and that's why you don't see an influx of caregivers in those types of boot camps or in online learning, right?   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Because as I spent time in ED School, I know that learning is very social and I'm a big believer that context is important. It’s great if you learn how to speak French by yourself, at home, in front of a computer but if—   Poornima:         No, I tried that. I have a terrible accent.   Tina Lee:            But yeah it would be better if you had actually visited France.   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            If you understood French culture and maybe even had some French friends and had a French meal. So it brings it all together and that's kind of the experience that we aim for because it’s not just the skills. It has to happen in context.   Poornima:         Yeah. So why teach these technical skills? Why not just get people to get better at management skills or some of the other softer skills? Why do you want to focus on tech skills?   Tina Lee:            I think tech is transforming our economy. It’s just going to be one of those things that we take for granted, right? And having that literacy is going to empower you to think about your own industry differently. And it’s going to impact the way you approach a problem differently. And I think once moms gain that level of tech literacy, it just gives them a level of confidence to approach this new phase in their life differently because a world of opportunity will open up, right? I think before in the beginning, when things were still very technical to the point where you had to have a bachelor’s or a master’s degree to understand it, then it was less accessible.                                 But now we're at the point where we've automated a lot of these things and made it a little bit more friendly. And I think if you're really going to innovate, it's just as important to understand the problems in the industry and then figure out the technical piece that goes along with that. And I think there's enough room for everyone to participate in that exercise.   Poornima:         So why don't we talk a little bit about the type of people you see coming to your program, other coders—are these people that are outside of tech? Or are they people within tech who maybe were on the business side and then wanted to transition into the technical side?   Tina Lee:            So, after running five cohorts now, some patterns are emerging, right? We mainly see women who are working moms and they want to get technical but can't find a solution that works with them because of scheduling or child care issues. They know that their path to career advancement requires them to gain this new skill set, right? So they want access to it and we provide that for them. Another group of moms who come to us, like you mentioned earlier, they may have stepped out for a little bit. A year, six months, some even 10 years, right? And they're just looking for a refresh. To figure out a way to connect their passions to a path forward.   And then the last group, these are entrepreneurs who have an idea for an app or they are already on their way to building a company and they just realize, like, "Hey, I'm kind of stuck now and I can't proceed without a grander understanding of what it is I'm trying to do and how to go about it." And so they come to us. So those are kind of the three groups that we see. In terms of industry background, they just run across the gamut. We have moms who worked in a startup only on the operations side. So they wanted to get closer to moms who were scientists, who are working in a lab. And they're like you know what? I actually want to do something else because it enables me to be more creative. So just really all over the map in terms of industry background.   Poornima:         And how do you go about doing the teaching?   Tina Lee:            So, we have a three-pronged approach. As I mentioned before, it’s not just the technical skills.   Poornima:         Sure.   Tina Lee:            So, we teach a little bit of code. All the moms are taught HTML, CSS, and JavaScript to build a basic website and how to launch it, but the goal of that really is to give them a taste of it, to see how it feels to build something and put it out into the world, and to really check themselves. “Do I like this enough to keep going?”   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Right? Or, “Is this enough? Or do I pivot?” The second piece that goes along with that is the community piece. So we bring in women from the field, like yourself, and we create this community not only of people who could mentor them, but people who provide access to job opportunities. And then of course they have each other.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Right? They can go to conferences together. They can just go to a café and help each other. And having that nerd mom comradery is really essential to success because, sometimes in the middle of the night and there's no one else there, you can feel like you can ping someone.   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            And then the last piece that we do, right, technical, community, and the last piece is the childcare piece, right? And that childcare piece really helps moms figure out in a safe space if this is something they want to go further. Right? And I would also argue that another piece of it is context. Although it’s hard to explain to people what I mean by that. What I mean by that is all of this is happening within context of what we see in everyday life and that piece of context is provided by the community, right? You come in and explain we use agile and that's what it means in our shop.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Or we believe in rapid prototyping and design thinking and that's how it works in our shop. Right? So all of these things are relevant. Not just the building part or not just the hanging-out-with-your-people part.   Poornima:         So that's great. So how do you pick a cohort?   Tina Lee:            We pick a cohort the way I would build a team.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            So because...before I used to be a technical rep, I spent some time being a recruiter, and having that safe space for learning is really important. And I realize how hard it is to do this when you are a mother as well. So I work with my board and we have several steps to our application process, the last one of which is an in-person interview.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            Where we really talk to the moms. “Are we right for you? Are you ready for this?” Because a lot of learning will have to happen outside of the classroom too, right? So they have to have capacity and they have to be really clear about why they're doing it because otherwise you're not going to stick to it and it's not going to feel like you achieved something at the end, right? So we walk them through that. And it’s worked out pretty well. All the moms come together and I think because being a mother is such a democratizing experience they all show up as people who are there to support each other, and want to learn together, and move forward together.   Poornima:         So walk us through what a day in the life of MotherCoders looks like.   Tina Lee:            Sure.   Poornima:         For your students.   Tina Lee:            So, Saturday only classes right? You would go...you would drop off your baby. So we have a half an hour transition time. It takes a while to explain have they eaten, have they slept, all that stuff.   Poornima:         Right.   Tina Lee:            So you hand off to the caregiver and you're in your seat by 10:00 right?   And then you learn until noon. And then we have lunch together. We always have lunch catered because it's such a special time and they have to bond. And a lot of times we'll have speakers there too, right, who will stay and hang out with them. So it’s a great time to just kind of network and talk. And then after lunch they learn some more. And then around 3, we leave half an hour for reflection. So I'm big on you learn, but at the end of the day, you have to pause and really connect what happened to how you're feeling about it and how it connects to your own understanding of the work, OK? And then after that they pick up their kid and then they go.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            In terms of content, it will vary by day. We have specific build days where people just get together and they build and we help you work through your wireframes and your issues. There are days when we have lectures. We don't really have a lot of lectures. We have “discussions,” I should call them. And then there are other days when we have guest speakers who come in and they talk about a topic that they want to talk about, or they do a workshop, or something I've been doing is I've been pairing a cyber security info sec expert with data scientists.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So on one side you have data scientists who want like all the data, and then the other side you have people who are in charge of the data or making sure they're following the rules about data and saying, "Whoa." So that's been a very illuminating conversation, too. So we've been doing stuff like that.   Poornima:         That sounds great. So how many people have you graduated? You mentioned you have five cohorts coming who have gone through the program?   Tina Lee:            Thirty-four so far.   Poornima:         Great. OK.   Tina Lee:            Yeah we're really delighted because 34 moms represents families, right?   Tina Lee:            And there is over 50 kids. And another way to think about this is we've placed 34 stem role models.   Poornima:         Oh, great.   Tina Lee:            Right? Into homes. They are inspiring our next generation of kids. Right? So not only are these women changing the trajectory of their own family like right now, their kids are going to be impacted, too. So we're really looking at this from a multi-generational perspective.   Poornima:         Yeah. That's fantastic. So what are some immediate outcomes that you see from them graduating in the program?   Tina Lee:            Jobs!   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            They're getting jobs.   Poornima:         Good. OK.   Tina Lee:            They're getting jobs in tech, right?   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So we have moms who have become front end engineers. We have moms who have become mobile app developers. We have moms who have become user experience designers. Some have been promoted, of course, because now they have this new tool kit. And then we have other moms who are proceeding with their startup dreams. So potentially, right, we have entrepreneurs out there. So, this has been really exciting to see them grow.   Poornima:         That's great. So it’s a lot of variety of outcomes but all pretty positive.   Tina Lee:            Mm-hmm.   Poornima:         So how do you measure success for MotherCoders?   Tina Lee:            Right now the way we're measuring success is completion.   We're also looking at how diverse we are in terms of the people that we have in our classes. Right? I'm an intersectional feminist.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            Eighty-one percent of women become moms and if companies are really worried about diversity? I'm like, “Come to me, because we have queer moms, we have moms that emigrated from other countries, like just everybody.” We just think about it racially, religiously, geographically, right? So the way we measure success—there's a piece of the diversity piece, and then there's a completion piece, and then we're starting to track not only who got jobs or who got promoted, but how much did they increase their income?   Poornima:         Oh, great.   Tina Lee:            Or earning potential? Right?   And that's been tricky because we've been running cohorts and it takes time. And different moms have different capacities, as I mentioned. And some of them have kids, again.   Poornima:         Sure.   Tina Lee:            Because moms do. So, we're trying to figure out a way to tell that story better but just anecdotally because there are only 34 moms, I keep pretty close tabs on them.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            I know that they are making more money because some are buying new homes.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            Some are buying new other things.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            And they're updating their LinkedIn profiles and LinkedIn tells me that, right?   Poornima:         Sure.   Tina Lee:            So we know that they're getting skills, getting new jobs, buying homes, and on top of that, starting businesses.   Poornima:         So I love that you care about this diversity piece, and I do, too. So I'm going to ask you this question: What about Father Coders? You know there's a lot of stay-at-home dads that's becoming less and less of a stigma, but would you ever be open to allowing men to come in and participate in your program?   Tina Lee:            Not in the foreseeable future.   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            And here’s why, right? The reason why we don't do Father Coders is exactly the same reasons why we do MotherCoders, right?   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            Think about it from a kind of a cultural perspective.   I have actually gone to meetups and programs. They're very friendly. Not that they're not friendly to women, but in terms of belonging, I think women have a harder time feeling a sense of belonging in those spaces, right? And you walk into a room and you don't see anyone who looks like you...it's very intimidating and there's a lot of trepidation around going back again.   So we create this safe space where we know that women will find inviting, right? And I think mothers specifically have a very unique set of challenges, right? That go beyond just being a woman, right? The scheduling, the feeling of pressure to be the perfect mom, and the perfect spouse, and the perfect worker, all the perfect things, right? And then on top of that picking up skills and working in an industry that's predominantly men is very intimidating, right?   Poornima:         OK.   Tina Lee:            So all of that comes together in MotherCoders. And I understand that fathers have the same challenges with scheduling, but I bet you they would feel less trepidation walking into a space that was designed more for someone without the challenges that moms have.   And we actually have had conversations with women who come up to me and say, "I'm not a mother but I care for a family member. Can I come?"   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So I can see at some point that we rethink our structure.   Poornima:         Oh I see. Right.   Tina Lee:            But we exist for the same reason that Hackbright exists and Women's Colleges exist.   I graduated out of a Women's College. So all of those things still stand and until we kind of break apart some of those barriers to women I think I need to keep doing what I'm doing now.   Poornima:         Thank you so much for coming on the show. Is there anything else you'd like to share with our audience before we end?   Tina Lee:            Yes, I would love to share with you kind of my pie-in-the-sky kind of vision that I'm working towards, right? Women from all all over the U.S. and the world reach out to me and ask when we're coming to their communities.   Poornima:         OK. Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So I know there's a desire for this type of training program all over and we're trying to figure out a way to get there. And we envision ourselves being in any community that wants to have a MotherCoders but, because, you'd know, technology varies by geography, and industry, and all these different things. We want to design a program that's thoughtful enough and flexible enough where they can design it to fit their local conditions, right? To fit the needs of their local employers so that moms will have a place to move to. So we are moving towards that. We are actively fundraising towards that.   And the reason that we're a nonprofit is because we're committed to helping women who cannot afford to pay $10,000 for Bootcamp or they're not sure if they want to invest in that even before having tried out something more preliminary. So we are working towards a vision where we're all across America, if not the world, so that we could help women everywhere as they transition into being moms and thrive in the workplace.   Poornima:         Great. So how can we help you with that?   Tina Lee:            Well, help us get our word out. This is great, right?   Help us send moms who are interested in taking our program to us. I would also love it if employers who are worried about retaining moms that they have to provide professional development for them through us. And then also figure out a way to maybe work with us to develop programs or return ships where women who may have stepped off want to get a refresh and then go back.   Poornima:         Yeah.   Tina Lee:            So those are great ways. And then of course, we're always looking for donations, always looking for sponsorships. So many ways to partner with us and everything can be found on our website.   Poornima:         Wonderful. Well we'll be sure to include the link to it.   Tina Lee:            Thank you.   Poornima:         Thank you again for joining us, Tina. Thank you for tuning in today and special thanks to our sponsor, Pivotal Tracker, for their help in producing this episode of *Femgineer TV*. If you've enjoyed this episode, then please be sure to share it with your friends, your team, your employer, and of course, all the mothers that you know to get the word out. And be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel to receive the next episode of *Femgineer TV*. Ciao for now.    

00:16 – Welcome to “Not Your Mother’s Podcast!” …we mean, “Greater Than Code!” 00:55 – Origin Story and Getting Involved in Coding 03:17 – Programming Perspectives From People of Different Backgrounds; Teaching Adults vs Children 08:19 – Work/Life Balance 11:32 – Changing Culture Around Gender Roles and Caregiving “Culture is like water in that it flows from the top down.” Nev Schulman Wants to Erase Gender Stereotypes for Parents (http://www.mtv.com/news/2976598/nev-schulman-gender-stereotypes-parenting-catfish-laura-perlongo-cleo/) 18:18 – The MotherCoders Organization (http://www.mothercoders.org/) What to expect when you’re done expecting (https://medium.freecodecamp.org/what-to-expect-when-youre-done-expecting-25fb0c00393?gi=ac6aa83c6d74) 24:27 – Teaching Frontend Development and The Stereotype that Women are Better at Frontend than Backend Work We can teach women to code, but that just creates another problem (https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/mar/14/tech-women-code-workshops-developer-jobs) 30:00 – Silicon Valley Elitism, Sexism, and Defining Cultural Norms; “The Ideal Worker” The Motherhood Penalty (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6ASw9OpvMg) 35:38 – Why do we not have many of women CEOs? 37:42 – Tactical Help for Cultural Changes Reflections: Mandy: Donate to MotherCoders and/or support them via AmazonSmile (https://smile.amazon.com/). Rein: The empowerment of women and the challenges they face are a global problem. @manwhohasitall (https://twitter.com/manwhohasitall) Coraline: Fostering entrepreneurship and empowering women worldwide. Also, thinking about role models and how to amplify voices. Tina: Including moms as a kind of marginalized group as well. This episode was brought to you by @therubyrep (https://twitter.com/therubyrep) of DevReps, LLC (http://www.devreps.com/). To pledge your support and to join our awesome Slack community, visit patreon.com/greaterthancode (https://www.patreon.com/greaterthancode). To make a one-time donation so that we can continue to bring you more content and transcripts like this, please do so at paypal.me/devreps (https://www.paypal.me/devreps). You will also get an invitation to our Slack community this way as well. Amazon links may be affiliate links, which means you’re supporting the show when you purchase our recommendations. Thanks! Special Guest: Tina Lee.

In this episode I talk with Tine Lee from MotherCoders, a tech orientation program that provides on-site childcare for mothers who want to learn basic coding, gain a deeper understanding of the technology landscape, and network with peers and industry professionals.

"There was a need to create a space where mothers felt welcome, because our challenges - they're very different from people who are learning who don't have these types of caregiving responsibilities." Continue reading… The post MotherCoders with Tina Lee appeared first on Software Engineering Daily.

Check out RailsClips!   01:53 - Michele Titolo and Women Who Code Introduction Twitter Blog Facebook 02:15 - Origin Story 501(c) Organization 03:11 - Stated Mission “Inspire women to excel in technology careers” 04:12 - Mentorship Glassbreakers (A peer mentorship community for professional women) 08:54 - Getting Started and Getting Involved 11:27 - Value 12:42 - Remote/Virtual Membership/Communication 15:08 - What Makes Women Who Code Different (from other groups)?     18:02 - Is there a need for groups like this? What issues do these address? 22:34 - Implementing Diversity into the Workplace Job Postings Michele's tweet about a job posting Practical and Universal Interview Questions Workplace Culture Benefits Communication & Teamwork Cate Hudson: Programmers and Racecars 32:29 - Terminology (Using words like “guys”) 35:16 - Is it really harder for women to get jobs? Resume Anonymization Dropping Out/Reentering the Tech Industry Re-Recruit From the Leaky Pipeline (Model View Culture article) 43:13 - The Community at Large (How can we help make the community more open and welcome?) Inclusive Events Codes of Conduct Change Within *Your Own* Organization (Advocacy) Learning About Other People (Be Empathetic; Be Respectful) 46:08 - Are there people who can help people/companies diversify? Ashe Dryden The Diverse Team by Ashe Dryden The Ada Initiative Natural Introductions 49:49 - How can I help? (as a man) Donations Fund Club AlterConf Volunteering 51:47 - Study Resources (Proof) Model View Culture Cosmodrome (from Brianna Wu)   Groups and Mailing Lists (mentioned in this episode) Glassbreakers Women Who Code SF (San Francisco) DevChix Tech LadyMafia   Girls Who Code Black Girls Code PyLadies Ladies Who Code RailsBridge App Camp For Girls Girl Develop It Mobile Bridge Geekettes PowerToFly MotherCoders The Ada Initiative Fund Club AlterConf Picks Power Up Your Animations! with Marin Todorov (Alondo) Poker Theory & Analytics (Alondo) Paracord (Chuck) Soto Pocket Torch (Chuck) Kate Heddleston: How Our Engineering Environments are Killing Diversity (Michele) Ashe Dryden: The Responsibility of "Diversity" (Michele) Conference proposal writing: From brainstorm to submit @ 360iDev 2015 (Michele)

Check out RailsClips!   01:53 - Michele Titolo and Women Who Code Introduction Twitter Blog Facebook 02:15 - Origin Story 501(c) Organization 03:11 - Stated Mission “Inspire women to excel in technology careers” 04:12 - Mentorship Glassbreakers (A peer mentorship community for professional women) 08:54 - Getting Started and Getting Involved 11:27 - Value 12:42 - Remote/Virtual Membership/Communication 15:08 - What Makes Women Who Code Different (from other groups)?     18:02 - Is there a need for groups like this? What issues do these address? 22:34 - Implementing Diversity into the Workplace Job Postings Michele's tweet about a job posting Practical and Universal Interview Questions Workplace Culture Benefits Communication & Teamwork Cate Hudson: Programmers and Racecars 32:29 - Terminology (Using words like “guys”) 35:16 - Is it really harder for women to get jobs? Resume Anonymization Dropping Out/Reentering the Tech Industry Re-Recruit From the Leaky Pipeline (Model View Culture article) 43:13 - The Community at Large (How can we help make the community more open and welcome?) Inclusive Events Codes of Conduct Change Within *Your Own* Organization (Advocacy) Learning About Other People (Be Empathetic; Be Respectful) 46:08 - Are there people who can help people/companies diversify? Ashe Dryden The Diverse Team by Ashe Dryden The Ada Initiative Natural Introductions 49:49 - How can I help? (as a man) Donations Fund Club AlterConf Volunteering 51:47 - Study Resources (Proof) Model View Culture Cosmodrome (from Brianna Wu)   Groups and Mailing Lists (mentioned in this episode) Glassbreakers Women Who Code SF (San Francisco) DevChix Tech LadyMafia   Girls Who Code Black Girls Code PyLadies Ladies Who Code RailsBridge App Camp For Girls Girl Develop It Mobile Bridge Geekettes PowerToFly MotherCoders The Ada Initiative Fund Club AlterConf Picks Power Up Your Animations! with Marin Todorov (Alondo) Poker Theory & Analytics (Alondo) Paracord (Chuck) Soto Pocket Torch (Chuck) Kate Heddleston: How Our Engineering Environments are Killing Diversity (Michele) Ashe Dryden: The Responsibility of "Diversity" (Michele) Conference proposal writing: From brainstorm to submit @ 360iDev 2015 (Michele)

Tina Lee is the founder of MotherCoders - a non-profit helping working moms grow their coding skills in the Bay Area. After having her first child, Tina had a difficult time being able to increase her coding skills while looking after her young one. An epiphany - she probably wasn't the only mom who needed childcare assistance to find the time/space to learn. Her organization just finished their first beta test and are in the process of raising more money for round two... and also figuring out what the next stage will look like. She shares her struggles, ideas, her measures of success, and the best advice she has for anyone starting a non-profit (or any other venture).

Tina Lee is the founder of MotherCoders - non-profit helping working moms grow their coding skills in the Bay Area. After having her first child, Tina had a difficult time being able to increase her coding skills while looking after her young one. An epiphany - she probably wasn't the only mom who needed childcare assistance to find the time/space to learn. Her organization just finished their first beta test and is in the process of raising more money for round two... and also figuring out what the next stage will look like. She shares her struggles, ideas, her measures of success, and the best advice she has for anyone starting a non-profit (or any other venture). Get full show notes and more information here: LaunchYourself.co/session19